CHARGE OF THEFT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21640, 4 November 1933, Page 11

CHARGE OF THEFT

NEW ZEALAND CLERKS RETURNING IN CUSTODY (Received November 3. 10.15 p.m.) SYDNEY. Nov. 3 Terence Nixon, aged 22, and Cyril Han kins, aged 25, clerks, were charged in the Sydney Police Court to-day with stealing £795, the property of the New Zealand Government. Accused were ordered to be returned to the Dominion in the custody of Detective Hamilton.

The Sydney police last January received a provisional warrant for the arrest of two New Zealanders. One man had been employed in a. Government office in Auckland. After the theft of £~9o had been discovered by New Zealand Government officials it was suspected that the missing employee was in Australia. The police on October 20 arrested one man in a Darlinghurst flat and a second man was arrested on Circular Quay. The theft referred to is alleged to have been committed by a former employee in the Auckland office of the Labour Department. Just before the Christmas vacation last year the official in question is said to have received from a higher officer two blank cheques already signed, which he had to fill in later in order to make certain small payments. It is alleged that ho filled in these two cheques for an aggregate of more than £7OO a:/id cashed them at a city bank. The-official under suspicion did not report for duty after the holidays, and only then was it discovered that an unauthorised sum had been drawn from the account.